"The Serena Also Rises" is the fifth episode of the second season of the American teen drama television series Gossip Girl, which originally aired on The CW on September 29, 2008. The episode was written by Jessica Queller and directed by Patrick Norris. In the midst of Fashion Week, a furious Blair Waldorf (Leighton Meester) plans on sabotaging Serena van der Woodsen (Blake Lively) after Serena claims her Queen Bee status and rejecting her for New York socialite Poppy Lifton (Tamara Feldman), during her mother's fashion show. Jenny Humphrey (Taylor Momsen) becomes a casualty of Blair's schemes as her father Rufus Humphrey (Matthew Settle) begins to see through her Jenny's lies. Meanwhile, Dan Humphrey (Penn Badgley) decides to hang out with Chuck Bass (Ed Westwick) to improve his writing, incidentally discovering a darker side to Chuck. Lily Bass (Kelly Rutherford) finds difficulty in her marriage with Bart Bass (Robert John Burke) when details behind her past are uncovered. Plot Blair designs a seating plan for Eleanor's fashion show and attempts to get back in favor with the girls at school by presenting them with front row tickets. However, the girls' attention is soon drawn to the society pages, which detail Serena's new friendship with society girl Poppy Lifton. Jenny suggests to Eleanor that they improve the guest list by getting Serena to invite Poppy and her friends. When Blair finds the seating plan changed, she sees it as a personal insult from Jenny and Serena, who normally watches the show backstage with her. (In fact, Jenny did not know Blair did the plan and Lily accepted Eleanor's offer without telling Serena.) Blair realizes Jenny has been playing truant to work for Eleanor and tells Rufus, who drags Jenny home from the atelier. Poppy suggests Serena placate Blair by inviting her to an after party, but when Serena goes to see Blair they end up arguing and Serena decides to go to the fashion show anyway. Dan meets his new mentor, Noah Shapiro, who is unimpressed that all his stories involve a sheltered boy from Brooklyn with girl troubles. Dan says that is all he knows so Shapiro tells him to get out of his comfort zone. Dan asks Chuck if he can spend an evening with him and Chuck is bored enough to agree. He feeds Dan pills and shots, takes him to a strip club and then leaves him